# Japan educational support for foreign children

> Live situation record from CLSTR: https://clstr.news/situations/japan-educational-support-for-foreign-children
> Updated: 2026-08-20T02:06:10.000Z. Sources: 2. Developments: 2.

The Japanese government is expanding educational support for foreign children to address a growing student population requiring Japanese language instruction. An expert panel for the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) recommended that the central government take a “lead role” in establishing national standards and “pre-class” language models to help students adapt to school life.

Following these recommendations, the ministry announced plans to upgrade Castanet, a digital portal for foreign students, in fiscal 2027. While the portal currently offers materials in approximately 30 languages, it is presently only available in Japanese. The upgrade will introduce multi-language support, including Chinese and Portuguese, and expand teaching materials to accommodate various proficiency levels to assist both students and teachers.

## Timeline

### 2026-08-20: Japan to upgrade Japanese-learning portal for foreign children

Japan's education ministry will upgrade its Castanet portal in fiscal 2027 to better support the record number of foreign children requiring Japanese language instruction.

2 sources. https://clstr.news/cluster/japan-to-upgrade-japanese-learning-portal-for-foreign-children

### 2026-08-09: Japan to expand language support for foreign children

Japan plans to expand Japanese language support and

2 sources. https://clstr.news/cluster/japan-to-expand-language-support-for-foreign-children

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Cite as: Japan educational support for foreign children. CLSTR, https://clstr.news/situations/japan-educational-support-for-foreign-children